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13 Jul 2014

hugh's onion and silverbeet tart

I find it hard to
pick my favourite vegetable, but jostling at the top of a very verdant list
(alongside green beans, peas and broccoli) is silverbeet. If only for its
determined reliability; it’s pretty much always in the garden. And right now,
it’s pretty much the only thing in my
garden! So I wanted a special way of cooking it.

Making anything
into a pie, tart or quiche — essentially, pairing any produce with pastry — lifts
it out of the ordinary. So I could think of no better way of treating those
dark crinkly leaves than this tart.

I first made this
after watching Hugh Fearnley–W whip it out in about 30 seconds on his River
Cottage vegetable series (allow me to digress a moment: I love River Cottage
shows, just for the scenery. Sometimes I don’t care for the food, or Hugh. I
want to live in that bucolic valley. I want a farmhouse, an Aga, a vegie plot
and a rambling country lane just like that. Is it ever unpleasant in that lush,
abundant part of the world?).

Of course in real
life a tart takes longer than a TV segment to prepare, but making pastry,
slowly cooking onions, then assembling layers are pleasurable tasks you don’t
mind spending time over.

This tart is also
very easy to make; my only hardship has been rolling out pastry in a cold
winter kitchen. I resorted to thumping the dough out with my marble rolling pin,
using its heft to my advantage. I was worried that such aggression would make
for a tough end product (and that my kitchen benchtop might collapse) but this
pastry is morishly short no matter what you do to it (including, surprisingly,
reheating it in the microwave, which usually spells a floppy death for pastry).

Finally, the
flavours are simple. There are times when you want spicy, cheesy, garlicky meals.
There are times when you want ‘the lot’. Then there are times when you want
merely silky golden ribbons of onion cooked gently with lemon thyme, the iron-y
darkness of silverbeet, all coddled in an unassuming eggy custard, and held in
a fine pastry. It’s not bland, it’s soothing and homely, and focusses our
tastebuds on those few precious ingredients.

Hugh’s onion and
silverbeet tart

Adapted from the beet
top/chard and ricotta tart in ‘River Cottage Veg Every Day!’. The original
recipe specified a 24 cm springform tin, and a baking time of 35 minutes.

First the prep, which you can do ahead of time.

First make the
pastry: in a food processor, whizz up 125 gms plain white flour, 125 gms plain
wholemeal flour, a pinch of salt, 125 gms chilled butter (you can also rub it
together with your fingers). With the processor running, dribble in about 75
mls cold milk, more or less, until the dough comes together. Remove from the
food processor, knead to bring together again, then wrap in cling film and
chill for about 30 minutes.

Meanwhile, finely slice
two medium onions and chop or crush a couple of garlic cloves. Take your time
to cook these down gently in olive oil; you want a lovely golden translucent colour
without any crispness. Towards the end, squeeze in the juice from half a lemon
and stir thru some fresh lemon thyme.

While the onion is
cooking, prepare your silverbeet (we can do lots of things at once!). Chop 300
gms of silverbeet, stalks and all, and steam until just done. Remove from heat
and squeeze as much moisture out as possible (I have left it draining in a fine
sieve overnight).

Now for the
assembly.

Preheat your oven
to 180.

Roll out the pastry
to a size that will fit a 20 cm springform tin, with the pastry about 4 mm
thick.

Line the tin with
the pastry, leaving any messy or overhanging bits for now. Line with foil and baking
weights, and blind bake for 15 minutes.

Remove foil and
weights, prick base of pastry with a fork, then return to oven and bake for
10–15 minutes, to get a gentle golden colour (you may need to put foil around
the edges to protect them from burning).

Meanwhile, whisk
together 3 large eggs, 150 mls thick cream and 150 mls milk. Have your onion
and silverbeet to hand, as well as 100 gms of ricotta.

Once the pastry
shell is ready, remove from oven and sit on a small baking tray (this makes it
easier to put back in the oven once filled). Place the onion on the base, then
layer with the silverbeet, blob or crumble in the ricotta, then carefully pour
over the egg mixture. You can also trim any messy or overhanging pastry edges
at this point if you are so inclined (as you can see, I'm not).

Put your tart back
in the oven and cook for 30 minutes. Then get impatient, crank up the heat to
200, protect the pastry edges with foil, and bake for another 30 minutes or
until the eggy custard is cooked and golden.

Remove from oven,
allow to stand for a few minutes before unclipping your springform tin and
serving.

You're right, everything does look so beautifully perfect in Hugh's world doesn't it. Oh that kitchen garden, it's divine. The tart looks good, I just happen to have some chard in the garden that I don't know what to do with, I might give this a try. CJ xx

I'm sure your tart tastes way better than anything pulled from the Aga at River Cottage! And after just a week of living in a house with an Aga I can tell you that they might look good and bake good bread, but in the middle of summer (even an English summer) they're the least practical way of cooking - our kitchen is like a sauna...

aw, thanks GD :-) maybe we should leave Agas firmly in the realm of fantasy, and not reality. i don't think there'd be many australians (even tasmanians!) who could tolerate a sweltering kitchen in the summer.

Word-verification is on, as the robot-spammers are loving my tuna past bake too much at the moment! I hope you understand - and I hope you'll still leave a comment at Dig In. I love hearing your thoughts, knowing someone is reading, and will always reply. Unless you're a robot-spammer.